07 May 2003
Troops Find Evidence of Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction Programs
(Mobile biological weapons laboratory found near Mosul) (650) By Merle D. Kellerhals, Jr. Washington File Staff Writer Washington -- A trailer found by U.S. troops outside the northern Iraqi city of Tall Kayf is suspected of being a mobile biological weapons laboratory from the now-defunct regime of Saddam Hussein, and it is now undergoing extensive testing and evaluation in Baghdad, says a senior Defense Department official. At a special Pentagon briefing May 7, Stephen Cambone, the under secretary of defense for intelligence, said the mobile laboratory was seized April 19 at a Kurdish checkpoint in northern Iraq. It had been freshly painted in a military camouflage pattern and thoroughly washed with a caustic solution to hide the work conducted in the mobile lab. He said there is no doubt about what the trailer's purpose was. "The experts have been through it. And they have not found another plausible use for it," Cambone said. What the U.S. military has in its possession is the kind of mobile laboratory that Secretary of State Colin Powell described in a report to the U.N. Security Council as he sought to justify forcibly disarming the Iraqi regime, he said. "So while some of the equipment on the trailer could have been for purposes other than biological weapons agent production, U.S. and U.K. tactical experts have concluded that the unit does not appear to perform any function beyond ... the production of biological agents,'' Cambone added. U.S. intelligence officials have said they believe Iraq had 18 mobile chemical and biological laboratories, but finding them will be a laborious process. Cambone said that, for example, U.S. troops found an Iraqi fighter jet that had been literally buried in the desert to hide it from coalition troops, an indication of Iraq's extensive efforts at deception. The laboratories were mobile to avoid detection by U.N. weapons inspectors or intelligence agents, to protect them from air or missile strikes, and to enable them to be brought to their point of use in the event of hostilities without detection, Cambone said. Cambone said the mobile lab is painted in a military color scheme, and was found on a transporter normally used for tanks. In line with the way an Iraqi defector has described Iraq's mobile labs, it contains a fermenter and a system to capture exhaust gases, items necessary for developing biological weapons. The trailer unit has been moved to Baghdad, where a team of experts is thoroughly evaluating the find and determining to what extent it had been used in the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMD) program, he said. The inspectors are literally taking the trailer apart to examine it, he said. Cambone said there were approximately 1,000 potential weapons sites in Iraq before the recent military operations, and of that number about 700 were believed to be linked to WMD production. To date, he said, only 70 sites have been examined by specially trained U.S. and British military nuclear, biological and chemical weapons teams, and more sites are being identified almost daily. "We do have in the coalition a comprehensive approach to identifying, assessing and eliminating Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs and delivery systems. And that effort is focused on three things," Cambone said. "We're looking to interview and obtain cooperation from key Iraqi personnel, some of whom are doing so as walk-ins and voluntarily, [and] others who have been members of the former regime. We're looking to access, and to assess, and to exploit a number of sensitive sites throughout the country. "And we're working very hard to obtain and exploit documents, computers, hard drives, things like that, which can give us some indication of how those WMD systems operated, and to glean from that additional information that we can use for another round of interviewing people and going after sites," he said. (The Washington File is a product of the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
